Creating The BanjoUke
How It All Started

BanjoUke started in 2012 with a radical thought – that we two, Curt & Ed, could develop and make a great banjolele that people could afford.

One that sounded as good as it looked, at a price far less than anyone else. It was a big ask, but we were totally confident we could do it.

We worked for a year – made 10 different models until we were satisfied. Voila – Our first hand made BanjoUkes!

The noise they make was music to the ears, & they looked wonderful. They all give a sweet & amazingly loud (50% louder than a uke) note that we thought was better than anything we’d heard.

When it was component selection time we chose the very best we could find, the toughest & most resonant drums, effective tuners, attractive rosewood and brass fretted fingerboards, fancy but functional tailpieces, resonant strings & matt finished mahogany necks.

A robust padded gig bag, an electronic tuner and a fully adjustable snap-on strap are included in the price!

Now we’re talking – or rather, playing.

The SideKick is born

We thought we’d maybe sell a few locally. But if you have a net site, you’re multinational. So in 18 months we’d sent our creations to US, Great Britain, Germany, Sweden, Australia and Canada. After making and selling over a hundred, we improved on the design to make it even easier to play and called it our SideKick! We made the neck longer – Tenor size – so each fret is just a little bit bigger and comfortable for chord placement.

We decided that a robust padded gig bag, electronic tuner and fully adjustable snap-on strap were to be included in the price!

In May 2015 our First SideKick deliveries went out to customers in 6 countries.